


why do we put each other through hell? (why can't we just get over ourselves?)

by michellejjones



Category: One Day at a Time (TV 2017)
Genre: Alvareider, F/M, Why by Shawn Mendes, also untranslated spanish, and if u dont get it just copy and paste it ig lol, based on the song, but i made the context of what is being said easy to understand, made up family members lmao, sorry - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-28
Updated: 2019-02-28
Packaged: 2019-11-06 21:46:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,120
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17947682
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/michellejjones/pseuds/michellejjones
Summary: Schneider is no Superman, not by a long shot, but as he finally turns his attention back to the movie and away from the small Cuban woman next to him, he thinks that out of all his various forms of kryptonite, she ranks higher than even his favorite bottle of brandy.[Alvareider. Oneshot. Set post-season 3.]





	why do we put each other through hell? (why can't we just get over ourselves?)

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first fanfic in MONTHS. Whoo. It's good to be back. This is also my first work for the ODAAT unvierse; I hope I do it a semblance of justice. The title and the work as a whole are heavily inspired and based on the song "Why" by Shawn Mendes; I would 100% recommend listening to it while reading this.
> 
> Also, I didn't proofread :'( I apologies for any grammar/spelling errors. 
> 
> Let me know what you think! And as always, feel free to leave me any prompts/comments. I love reading how you enjoyed my work/what you'd like to see me write :')

“ _I know a girl, she's like a curse  
We want each other, no one will break first  
So many nights, trying to find someone new  
They don't mean nothing compared to her.”  
__**-**_ __ **shawn mendes; why.**

“How have you never seen a _Superman_ movie?” Penelope’s voice is loud -per the usual ~~-~~ and unbelieving -per _not_ the usual. She’s staring at him like he’s got eight eyes instead of six, like he’s spoken Russian instead of English.

Shneider shrugs, suddenly self conscious: “I don’t know, Pen, I just never got around to it. So sue me.”

“I might!” Penelope squints at him, “some best friend I’ve got.”

Shneider feigns being offended; in reality, even with her annoyed at him, he’s still happy to hear her acceptance of him through the words _best friend._ Penelope checks her phone, then looks at him with a gaze that could cut steel. “What are you doing tonight? Any plans?”

In the back of his mind Schneider remembers he’s got a date with a pretty redhead he’d met in Whole Foods. “Why?” He asks, without answering her original question.

“Because I’m miraculously free tonight and if you are too, then we’re watching freakin’ _Superman.”_ She crosses her arms, staring him down, and in the golden light that floods through her apartment, she glows like a goddess.

Suddenly the pretty redhead doesn’t seem that pretty. Or as important.

Deciding not to read into this development that sometimes arises when he looks at Penelope, Schneider pulls out his phone and feigns checking his calendar; in reality, he’s making a lame excuse and canceling his date. She’ll get over it; they barely knew each other. “Nope,” he proclaims, once done. “No plans. My place?”

“10 o’clock; Mami will be asleep by then because her _beauty sleep calls,_ Alex is at a sleepover, and Elena will be deep in her studies. I’ll bring snacks.” She smiles at him, uncharacteristically sweet. Schneider clears his throat, but the butterflies don’t clear along with it.

“Sounds like a date.”

**...**

Schneider doesn’t know much about _Superman,_ but even going in to the movie, he knew that the godlike hero had one crucial, showstopping weakness: his kryptonite.

They’re sitting on his couch, her feet in his lap like it’s the most natural thing ever (because it is), watching the movie; but even as her eyes remain glued to the screen, his wander, bouncing from the screen to her and back again, an endless loop. This, this is rare; to do something just them two. It’s rarer for it to be _planned._ Most of the time Lydia is with them -and though she is always welcome, this is most certainly not _un_ welcome. And if not Lydia, then one of the kids -also not unwelcome, never unwelcome, but again: this change of pace is definitely a nice one.

He thinks, suddenly and naturally, that if she asked, he would cancel all his future dates for moments like this; his feet on her lap, his arm draped across her calves, the other one on the sofa arm, buried in a bag of chips while she attacks the popcorn she had brought and (naturally) hogged all to herself.

Schneider is no _Superman,_ not by a long shot, but as he finally turns his attention back to the movie and away from the small Cuban woman next to him, he thinks that out of all his various forms of kryptonite, she ranks higher than even his favorite bottle of brandy.

**...**

And he has tried (continues to try) blocking out how he feels, blocking out the way he can get around her. It would be easier, he knows, if she didn’t show the same exact struggle.

But over the years, Schneider has gotten to know the Alvarez clan very well, and none more so than Penelope. He knows her mannerisms, her tells, her sense of humor, her anxieties and stresses, her dreams and aspirations. He gets her. And he genuinely wishes he didn’t -because understanding Penelope means that she’s as fucked up as him, if not a little more, albeit in drastically different ways.

He gets her and she gets him. So he sees the way she gets around him sometimes -the soft looks, the way she moves to touch him before blinking and brushing past him instead. The affectionate insults. The way she cares so much about him she gets so angry that she cries. He sees her. He’s only so blind.

But that’s the thing about Penelope and him; _she gets him too._ She sees the way he will open his door for her at any time of the night; she’s not stupid to how he cancels his plans to do whatever she asks of him. She catches the way he looks at her, with affection so deep and love so open she knows it goes deeper than the best friend status they have granted each other.

Penelope is his blessing, but she’s also his curse. Because he’s tried to forget her, to find someone new; there have been Colombians and Puerto Ricans and Cubans and Russians and Koreans and all the white girl “ishes” imaginable, but they don’t mean anything compared to her.

The closest he ever came to forgetting her was Avery, but even Avery faded away, gone to Austria, where she never came back.

Across the table, Elena says something about the SAT she’s taking this Saturday, and Penelope brushes her leg against his on accident. Yet she lets it rest, and he lets her stay, and he thinks to himself that it’s funny how much they want each other. He thinks to himself it’s funny that two people could want each other so much, but be so stubborn that no one will break first.

* * *

“ _When people ask about us, now, we just brush it off_  
I don't know why we act like it means nothing at all  
I wish that I could tell you that you're all that I want.”  
**-shawn mendes; why.**

Penelope asks Schneider to attend her cousin’s party with her, and, like she knew he would, he agrees. It’s last minute and she knows he had to cancel plans for it, but really, if he canceled them that easily, it couldn’t be that important, right?

(This is a big lie. Schneider would cancel the world if she asked. There’s no telling how important his plans had been.)

They walk in to Damaris’ party arm in arm, her in a summer dress and him in jeans and a flannel rolled up to his elbows. _“_ _Hola,_ Lupe,” Damaris gives her a hug and then gives one to Schneider, too, launching into rapid Spanish about where the food is and _“delante, delante,_ _pasa delante.”_ She smiles at Schneider when he thanks her for allowing them in to her house, and gives Penelope a pleased smile before greeting her other guests.

Family members come and go around them, children laughing and screaming as they run by. Alex has been here for a day already; he slept over. Lydia arrived with them but quickly branched off to say her own hellos, alone. And Elena left for college a week ago already. Penelope tries not to think about it.

Schneider seats her down next to the little kids, the five and unders who are playing in the open door to the master bedroom. It’s like he can sense that she’s missing her daughter -she realizes he probably can, that he probably misses her too. “I’m gonna go get you a drink, okay?” He smiles at her, squeezes her shoulders, and disappears out the door, but not before Mateo, who’s around two, barrels towards him. Schneider intercepts the little boy and takes him up into his arms. Mateo looks into Schneider’s face, then looks at the view Schneider presents due to his height, and laughs, a happy gurgling sound. Shrugging, Schneider lets the toddler settle before striding out the door and out of sight.

Penelope, though endeared, isn’t surprised; babies love tall people, and babies love Schneider. Something about him, she guesses. Makes him easy to love.

Joyce, who’s eighteen and saw the whole thing, smiles as she gives her five year old sibling a crayon so she can color. _“Que chulos,”_ she comments, absentmindedly. _“Enamorados que estan.”_

“Yeah… wait, what?” Penelope asks, catching the meaning of what Joyce has just said.

Joyce blinks, her curly brown hair bouncing as she turns her full attention to her relative. “You and your boyfriend,” Joyce says. “You two are cute together. Very in love.”

“Oh,” Penelope laughs, “no, we’re not together.”

“Why not?” Joyce’s brow furrows.

Penelope wonders how exactly she and Joyce are related. Second cousins? Third? Deciding it doesn’t matter, Lupe takes one of the babies that had crawled towards her in her arms. This one is… Adrian, Penelope remembers. Nine months. “We’re just friends,” Penelope shrugs, cradling Adrian, watching him watch her. She misses Elena.

Nodding slowly, Joyce drops the subject. However, Dina -who is Penelope’s first cousin- does not. She’s sitting on the bed with Anamaria and Anabel, who are twins. _“Ay Lupe,”_ She says, _“no te pongas pendeja.”_

“I am _not_ a dumbass!” Penelope is offended.

Dina rolls her eyes, _“Ese gringo te quiere, Lupe,”_ Dina stops Anabel from barreling towards her sister. _“_ That man loves you. And anyone can see _que sientes algo por el. No te pongas pendeja. La quimica esta buena y pues si es gringo, pero es buena gente.”_

Penelope blinks, about to tell her cousin off, but she can’t find the energy to be angry. So instead, she laughs and says _“como sabes que es buena gente?”_

“You would _never_ let anyone near your children unless they were good people. And you would never bring a random man to a family party unless you trusted him.”

“Lupe,” Joyce pipes up again, “why _did_ you bring him?”

She’s at a loss for words. Her excuse earlier had been that she didn’t want him to be alone tonight, and if he was really family, he should come to events like this. But in light of what Joyce and Dina have argued, it seems weak. She wonders why Alex and her Mami let her get away with such a weak ass excuse.

 _Probably because they know,_ Lupe thinks wryly.

Finally, Penelope kisses Adrian’s cheeks and says, “because I wanted to. It doesn’t mean anything.”

Suddenly, Tio Hector swings into the room, holding a bottle of beer in one hand and Mateo in the other. _“Lupe,_ I thought you’d like to know _que tu novio_ is surrounded by a bunch of your _tias,_ who keep asking him about your relationship.”

Lupe releases Adrian, ready to save Schneider, but even as she flies out of the room, she still manages to let out a, “He’s not my boyfriend, Tio!”

“ _Si,”_ Her uncle hollers back, _“y yo no soy Cubano!”_

**...**

As she and Schneider do damage control, she can’t help ask herself why they keep brushing it all off, why they act like it means nothing at all.

She wishes she could tell him he’s the one that she wants.

But then she looks at him, at how at home he is, and thinks she can’t mess this up.

* * *

“ _When I hear you sing, it gets hard to breathe_  
Can't help but think every song's about me  
And every line, every word that I write  
You are the muse in the back of my mind.”  
**-shawn mendes; why**

She’s not the best singer. But she can carry a tune. He walks into the apartment one day to find Lydia playing her music. Alex is sitting in front of the t.v., playing video games. And Penelope is out of sight. Schneider helps Lydia with the dishes for a bit, and then when she kicks him out of the kitchen, he wanders down the hall, until he hears Penelope’s voice through her room. It’s a song he recognizes because it’s a song he showed her -from that old Shawn Mendes album, the one that she insisted was too hipster for her but that she memorized all the songs to, nonetheless.

Idly, subconsciously, Schneider wonders if she’s singing about him. He wonders because she’s who _he_ sings about, who inspires his paintings when he goes to art class. The eternal muse, put into persona with her.

* * *

“ _Don't want to ask about it 'cause you might brush it off  
_ _I'm afraid you think that it means nothing at all  
_ _I don't know why I won't admit that you're all I want.”_  
**-shawn mendes; why.**

It is two in the morning when Penelope knocks on his door. He knows it’s her because she called him two minutes before, so he stumbles towards the door without his glasses on, blind but feeling. She’s got an oversized shirt on, so big that it covers the shorts that he’s sure she’s wearing. Her curly hair is matted in some places and frizzed up in others. Her face is red. She’s been crying.

“Pen,” Schneider says, “what’s wrong?”

And then she is in his arms, falling apart freely. The rest of the world falls away as he soothes her, as she tells him what’s wrong, as she lets her catch him.

**...**

They are sitting on her balcony, Lydia at the Opera with Dr. Berkowitz and Alex at his dad’s. Penelope and Schneider both have ice cream in their hands and watch the city below them, laughing and enjoying each other; her, his goofy company, and he, her sassy commentary.

He thinks about asking her, then. About acting his age and dropping his _payaseros,_ and asking her what the _fuck_ was going on between them. Ask when everything had shifted, because (on his part, anyway) it had all happened so naturally that he’d been in the middle before he’d become aware of what was happening. But as she makes a joke about his melting ice cream, he bites his tongue, afraid that she’ll brush it off.

Or worse, that she’ll think it all means nothing at all.

But then she smiles, and all at once, he doesn’t understand why he can’t admit that she’s all that he wants.

* * *

“ _I pretend that I'm not ready  
_ _Why do we put each other through hell?  
_ _Why can't we just get over ourselves?  
_ _And you say hi like you just met me  
_ _Why do we put each other through hell?  
_ _Why can't we just get over ourselves?”_  
 **-shawn mendes; why**

When Elena comes home for the summer, she pushes it.

“I’m not discussing this.” Penelope tells her daughter. Alex is watching, interested, from his perch on the sofa’s arm.

“But why not? Mom-”

“-I’m not discussing this, because there is nothing to discuss.” Penelope arches a brow at her only daughter, waiting for her to test the waters.

But to Penelope’s surprise, it isn’t Elena that tests things. It’s Alex. “Mami, I’ve watched you both for almost my whole life. Haven’t you ever noticed that out of all the men in your life, he is the only one that’s ever stayed?” Alex lifts himself off his perch and walks towards his sister and mother. “You both put each other through so much, but you forgive each other and come out stronger. And sure, you’re best friends… but everyone can see there’s something else there, Mami. Even through the hard things you put each other through, there’s so much good. The way you two laugh with each other and look at each other. It makes me feel gross, but also happy.” Alex hugs her, “because you’re my Mami, and Schneider makes you happier than any guy you’ve ever dated.”

The curtain rips open and Lydia chimes in, her voice gentle but firm, somber but affectionate: “It is true, Lupe. _Tu bobo_ makes you happier than you were even with Victor.”

Penelope blinks.

Silence settles upon the apartment.

“Why do you two put each other through so much hell, Mom?” Elena sighs. “Why can’t you just get over yourselves?”

A million excuses that have dried out run through Lupe’s mind, but finally, she settles onto one: “I’m not ready.”

All three of her family members let out an exhausted groan. “Yes you _are._ ” Elena objects, “you’re just scared of losing your best friend and of losing the man that helped raise your kids and take care of your mother.”

“Nobody takes care of me!” Lydia objects. “But _Eschneider_ does dance with me sometimes, when he can see I am sad.”

Penelope digs up another excuse. “If he really liked me he would’ve said something by now-”

“-ay, Mami.” Alex rolls his eyes, “the man would never push himself on to you. He would never do anything to make your relationship awkward.”

“If he thinks his advances would be unwelcomed, he would never try to approach.” Lydia gives her daughter a sorry sort of look.

“Mami,” Elena kisses her mom, “you’ve gotta go to him.”

“It’s you and Schneider. It always has been.” Alex goes back to the couch and presses play on his show.

“We will be waiting.” Lydia points to the door, “don’t be a _pendeja,_ and don’t be a chicken.”

And, well. No one calls Penelope a _pendeja_ or a chicken.

**...**

When he opens the door, he notices that she says “hey” like she’s just met him.

She’s looking at him openly, the way she only does when she’s tired or upset or in the quiet moments when she thinks he’s not looking. She is looking at him in the way he’s only ever dreamed she would: like she’s finally gotten over herself.

Her mouth opens and closes, then opens again, then closes. Finally, she says, “our family talked to me. About us.”

It’s the way she says it. _Our family,_ with a small smile and a look of love on her face that stays there even after she’s said the words. _Us._

“Yeah?” He asks.

“Yeah.”

She takes his hands and he guides them to his heart, where she can feel it pumping. “I’m... I don’t, it’s been a long time coming, but still-”

“-Pen,” Schneider’s voice is soft, steady, but firm. The goofiness he usually has is gone. The stark change from his usual aloofness startles her into silence. “Penelope. Did you come up here to ask me out?”

Lupe groans, and then laughs. “Yes. I did.”

Slowly, Schneider nods. “I’d love to go out with you.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

A beat passes between them, before Schneider cups her chin in his hand and says, “why’d we put each other through hell, huh?”

“Because we couldn’t get over ourselves.”

He snorts, “stop speaking sense.”

And so, instead of speaking at all, she kisses him.

And he kisses her back.


End file.
